Drivers' Education, Sponsored by OG Racing

Details

Last Updated: Thursday, 20 January 2022 18:27

Welcome to PCA Potomac's Drivers’ Education Program (DE). This program is not your High School Drivers’ ED! The Potomac DE program provides you with an opportunity to improve your driving skills and learn to drive your car safely at speeds above highway limits with high accuracy on closed-circuit professional road courses. Currently we run our events on 6 different racetracks. Included are all three circuits at Summit Point (West Virginia), VIR (Alton, VA), Watkins Glen (NY), and Pitt Race (Wampum, PA). Many of these are tracks you have enjoyed seeing raced on TV.

As a novice DE participant, you will drive with an instructor who will teach you the safest, smoothest and most consistent way to drive as quickly as is safe for the conditions and your skill level at that time. Prerequisites for DE events include prior track time from another DE Program, Potomac's spring or fall High-Performance Driving Clinic (HPDC), or Autocross School and Autocross participation.

DE is not racing, but Potomac is the birthplace of the PCA Club Racing program and sponsors PCA’s oldest continuously held Club Race, having hosted the first PCA race west of the Mississippi in 1992, and holding one at Summit Point every year since. You can read more about Club Race here.

The focus of DE is and always will be safety for all participants and for their vehicles. DE differs from racing in several important ways. DE provides drivers with a learning environment where the goal is to improve their individual driving skills in a safe and fun way. The order in which drivers start or finish a DE session is irrelevant. Racing, by contrast, provides drivers with a competitive environment where the goal is to be the first across the finish line. DE stresses learning and consistent improvement of skills in a safe environment. Cars are permitted to pass, but only in specific areas of the track (passing zones) and with permission from the car being passed (passing signal). This permits cars to pass other cars only in straight sections of the track that are specifically designated as passing zones. To further increase the safety of the learning environment in a DE, course workers (flaggers) are positioned around the track to help communicate to the driver conditions or obstacles on and off the road surface. These can include slippery course conditions, potential mechanical issues with your car, another car approaching from the rear, and any actions that appear to be inconsistent with the safe learning environment that DE emphasizes.

A relatively new benefit to our DE program is the Driver Ambassador Program, which is a team of volunteers available to reach out to drivers new to PCA Potomac. These ambassadors can answer questions about any aspect of our DE program before and after event registration, as well as at the track, just look for the ambassador logo.

The goals in DE are 1) to be safe, 2) to have fun, and 3) to learn about driving your car smoothly and consistently. Threshold braking, cornering techniques, "the line", "heel and toe" and vehicle dynamics are among the topics reviewed on the track and in mandatory classroom sessions, taught by our experienced and certified driving instructors.

PCA Potomac is also a social club, and new participants are welcomed and appreciated by the entire DE community. Although we love our Porsches, we encourage other passenger car marques to participate. (SUVs and Trucks are not permitted by track rules. Firearms are not allowed during track events. No alcohol or recreational drugs while cars are on track.) 

A Potomac DE-specific Tech Form is required for Potomac DEs, and can be found here: Tech Inspection Form

For information regarding COVID-19 protocols at our events, please watch this video:

To learn more about DEs, read our FAQ Page.

Read the 2019 DE message from the Chair

Drivers' Education Schedule for 2022 (Planned)

The Drivers' Education Team

Chair
Bob Mulligan & Susan Kimmitt

DE Registrars
Chris Mantzuranis, David Evans & Henrik Ojikutu

Track Registrar
Lara Peirce

Cashier
Roger McLeod, Jr.

Track Coordinator
Jay Smith

Co-Chief Instructors
Steve Wilson, Don Mattran, Sean Reiche & Brian Walsh

Instructor Development
Jay Smith

New Driver Ambassadors
Michael Kaunitz & Jim Musgrave

Tire Rack Street Survival
Bill Dooley

Tech Chairs
David Diquollo, Daniel Salsbury & John Vrankovich

Track Stewards
Tim Kearns, Steve Vetter, Stephen Kiraly & Mark Salvador 

Contact the Drivers' Education team HERE